


Little Secrets.

by cereal



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-10
Updated: 2015-04-10
Packaged: 2018-03-22 05:29:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3716878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cereal/pseuds/cereal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's not quite keen on calling this thing, "hopping," but Doctor Smith is insistent she not call it teleportation. "It'll draw attention that way. Hop, Rose, hop for your life." (a suddenly-got-superpowers AU.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Little Secrets.

**Author's Note:**

> Back in the day, I wrote [this superhero AU](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1019198), and immediately wanted to do superpowers in a different way. So now, two and a half years later, there’s this. Title from the Passion Pit song of the same name.

Fucking _Wales_.

They're going to _Wales_.

It's...it's...oh, goddamn it.

Maybe the fact that she can't come up with the precise word for the mix of indignation and anger she feels about _Wales_ is telling.

They're an underprivileged school, in an underprivileged area, so naturally her vocabulary is limited, and so, too, are the options for public-funded educational trips.

Apparently.

Because: _Wales_.

She's got a Facebook and a couple of rich friends, friends who made it out of the estate, friends whose dads stayed alive long enough to make something of themselves, friends whose school trips are to Spain, and to Italy, and even to bloody _America_.

Friends whose pictures she sees on the flickering screen of her pink iMac, the one that's more than ten years old, that Mickey picked up at a charity shop in the single most romantic thing that's ever been done for her in 17 years on this planet.

Wales, an ancient pink computer, and a Facebook of her own that she hasn't updated in months.

Because.

Well.

What would she even say?

&&.

It turns out Wales isn't so bad when you spend the bus trip there with a few thermoses of Ribena and vodka.

By the time they arrive, Rose feels warm and tingly, just the right amount of buzzed.

(Unlike Mickey, who'd challenged himself to chug straight through for the length of the Severn Bridge. Mickey is _beyond_ buzzed, past pissed, and well into sicking up in a bin as soon as the bus doors open.)

The sky is blue, the weather is pleasant, and she's surrounded by signs written in both English and Welsh — something that keeps her and Shareen busy the entire length of the courtyard.

They sound the words out (poorly), and then they make up translations (hilariously).

Shareen declares that one large green sign reads, "Wankers say ' _what_ ,'" and when Adam Mitchell says 'what' with his very next breath, they collapse into laughter that lasts right through the double doors of a very imposing building, with some very imposing lettering overhead.

(Their previous translation indicates it says, "Sorry you're poor and not in Spain.")

It's an overnight trip, insofar as they're staying in some two-bit hotel to sleep the night and then waking up first thing to drive back, but this — this visit to whatever this building is — it's the main attraction.

The _only_ attraction.

And there's probably a paper to write or something afterward.

Fucking _Wales_.

They're led into a lecture hall that looks about a thousand times more modern and expensive than any class she's ever sat in, but that's not the most interesting part.

The most interesting part is that they're not alone.

The seats are already more than half full with hundreds of other students, there's a bank of empty seats near the front, on the left side, and a bloke in a suit directs Rose's class toward them.

On the way, she catches snatches of conversation, nothing she can make out, not really — except for all the accents.

It's like being on the Tube or watching telly or something, kids from all over, all speaking together, English and Scottish and Welsh, some accents so thick she can barely parse them as the same language she knows.

"What are we here for again?" she asks Shareen.

Shareen shrugs. "Learning?"

"Right," Rose says, "but _what_ are we learning?"

"Stuff," Shareen says confidently, tapping Rose on the end of her nose.

Rose crinkles her nose in response, trying to sober up a little. Was there a note sent home to parents about this? What did it say? Did her mum sign it?

Before she can ask herself any more questions, Mickey's joining them again, chewing a piece of gum (thank god), and ushering them into the aisle as the bloke in the suit jogs to the front of the room.

With a couple quick taps on a microphone mounted to the podium, he gets the room to quiet down.

"Hello!" he says, and feedback screams through the speakers. "Ooh, no, no."

He adjusts something and then leans in to try again. "Hello? Oh, yes, that's better. Hello and welcome to the first annual...well, _first_ , can't be _annual_ yet, of course —"

From the front row, not too far from Rose, an imposing-looking man with dark hair clears his throat and shakes his head at the bloke behind the microphone.

The bloke nods and claps his mouth shut, a little flurry of limbs accompanying the action and making Rose reevaluate her initial assessment of his age. She'd thought he was, like, an adult, but it must've just been the suit, because now it's clear he can't be much older than her.

Plus, his suit is tight and brown, with pinstripes, for fuck's sake. No adult she knows would be running around in a suit like that.

She's no sooner thought it than Shareen's elbowing her.

"He's wearing _trainers_ ," Shareen says, and points to the bottom of the podium, where the bloke's foot is tapping nervously.

Oh, yeah, definitely not an adult.

"I'm Doctor Smith," the bloke says. "Welcome to —"

Before he can finish, before Rose can parse that this guy said he was a _doctor_ , the lights go out with a shower of sparks and a _**boom**_!

There's a moment of screaming, literally just a millisecond, before it sounds like the room has been muted entirely.

All noise drops out, the silence suddenly a tangible and unnerving thing, choking Rose, suffocating her in darkness, crawling down her throat and into her ears, making her feel like she can't breathe, like she's never been happy, like the world is a void and she is something dead and rotting. She can't move — doesn't _want_ to move — her body doesn't exist, nothing exists.

And then... _light_.

There's a glow like she's never seen before, like a thousand sunrises, a million, and it spreads so fast, it's like lightning up the walls, down the aisles, criss-crossing the floor and ceiling in a grid until they're surrounded, until Rose feels enveloped, warm and safe.

Whatever it is, it has a pulse to it, a heartbeat, and Rose feels her own sync up in her chest, a few stumbling too-fast beats, and then it finds the rhythm. Her blood pumps like a melody, something light but _building_.

It’s reaching, growing, changing, and then a headache blooms at her temples, a heavy soreness blanketing her limbs. It’s the end, she knows, the end of this and the beginning of something, and when the light disappears she has only a moment to miss it, to recognize the loss, before she collapses.

Everything’s dark again, and she is unconscious.

&&.

Rose wakes to the feel of her cheek pressed against something cold and smooth.

_The floor_ , she realizes. She is on _the floor_.

The pain at her temples has receded, replaced by a deep throb at the back of her head. When she touches it, her fingers come away clean, so at least she’s not bleeding.  

There are chairs above her, surrounding her, and underneath the legs she can see hundreds of other bodies — other _students_ — in various stages of waking.

Next to her, sprawled on either side, are Mickey and Shareen. Mickey’s flat on his back, eyes wide open as he stares at the vaulted ceiling. 

She scoots closer to him, pops her head into his line of vision.

“I am _never_ drinking again,” Mickey groans, and then chokes, a violent, loud coughing that scares Rose, until he flips over and spits out his gum.

She grins, despite the situation.

Together they work to wake Shareen, Rose gripping her shoulders and shaking lightly while Mickey tries prying her eyelids open.

Shareen’s hands rise quickly, and she swats at each of them before propping herself up on her elbows. “I’m up, I’m up,” she says, and then gives an echo of Mickey’s groan, shaking her head. “I wanna go back _down_.”

Rose snorts out a breath and helps pull her into a sitting position instead.

“What the hell _was_ that?” Shareen says, and scrubs her palms into her eyes, smearing the mascara that coats her lashes even thicker than Rose’s own.

“Dunno,” Mickey says, his tone somehow managing to broadcast his disinterest in finding out in just a single word.

(It’s that exact tone that ended their relationship, and it makes Rose want to find the answers herself even more.)

She can see more of the students waking, some are standing, moving down the aisles, and she pushes herself up to join them. “Let’s go find out.”

Shareen winces when she moves to stand and Mickey latches on, blustering an excuse for both of them to stay.

Rose barely hears it, she’s already in the aisle, moving toward the front of the hall. The lecturer — _Doctor Smith_ , right? — is slumped against the podium, his head hanging limply with his chin to his chest and something is telling her to go to him, he’s what she needs. 

She navigates past the rest of her class, noting that the dark-haired man from the front row, the one that had cut off Doctor Smith's rambling, is nowhere to be found. 

With the tip of her trainer, she nudges Doctor Smith's calf, trying to rouse him. When that doesn't work, she moves to stoop beside him, gripping his shoulder and shaking — a bit less gently than she'd done to Shareen. 

“Hey, oi, you, wake up, tell me what happened,” Rose says.

He groans, head lolling from one side to the other. “How should I know? Ask the lorry driver.”

“What? Oh. A joke. _Brilliant_.”

A weak grin flickers across Doctor Smith’s face, but then his eyes are closed again, his body still, and Rose is back to trying to wake him up.

“No, no, no, you’re the science bloke, I want an explanation now,” she says, mimicking a tone she’s heard her mum use a million times. 

In response, he mumbles the word ‘science’ and his brow furrows, but he doesn’t offer any answers and he doesn’t open his eyes. 

“Ugh, bloody _Wales_ , I just want to go _home_!”

There’s a feeling like fireworks, like gunpowder and sparks and fast-fizzing-brightness and then she’s —

_what_ the _**fuck**_

— then she’s sitting on top of a broken coffee table, _her_ own broken coffee table, in the middle of her own bloody flat.

She’s still got her hand wrapped around Doctor Smith’s shoulder and he’s well awake now, staring at her in slack-jawed astonishment. 

“Where are we? What did you do? How did you do that?” His voice is fast and excited.

She can’t answer, not only because she doesn’t _have_ answers, but because her mum’s rushing in.

“What’s all this?” her mum shrieks, and then her eyes glance to Doctor Smith. “Oh, honestly, Rose! Already? You only just ended things with Mickey.”

Rose scrambles off the broken table and into a corner. “Everybody just stop!”

Her mum and Doctor Smith stare at her, apparently listening. 

“Now, Mum, I don’t know this bloke —"

“Well, doesn’t that just make it worse, sweethea—"

“No, not like that, I don’t _know_ him, I’m supposed to be in _Wales_ , don’t you remember? We _were_ in Wales! And now we’re here! It’s like we telepo—”

She wants to keep talking, she tries to keep talking, but Doctor Smith’s grabbing up her hand, tugging her across the living room with a look that implores her to be quiet. 

He turns back to her mum, scratching at the back of his head with his free hand. “Ma’am, I, ehm, knew it was a risk, starting up with…Rose?”

Rose nods her head a tiny bit in confirmation.

“Yes, _Rose_ — I knew it was a risk, that she was still healing from, uh, Rickey, but I’m going to see it through.”

And then, with a wild grin, he’s dragging her out the door of the flat. 

“What the hell was that?” She moves to lean against the railing, and then thinks better of it, purposefully setting her hands on her hips in a way she hopes is demanding. 

"That was, _well_ , that was basically saving your life is what that was. You're welcome." He sniffs and straightens his tie. 

"What?"

He shrugs. "People find out you've got superpowers, they're probably gonna try and dissect you."

" _What_?!"

&&.

It's another 20 minutes before she gets any real answers. 

And five more after that before she gives up on trying to make sense of it. 

Laboratory, experiments, explosion — that's gonna have to do for now.

&&.

"All right, you're sure this going to work?" 

"Ye _p_! Just think of where you want to be and you should be there. But you have to _really_ feel it — our initial tests indicated this only activated when subjects experienced high emotion. Of course, they only moved across the lab, but, you! You got us from Wales to London on your first go."

It's enough of an ego stroke that Rose feels confident she can do this, so she thinks — _hard_ — Blackpool, Blackpool, Blackpool and goes...

...exactly...

...nowhere.

She's still on the balcony at the estate, little note pinned to her shirt and flapping in the wind.

("What if you're disoriented when you land, Rose? This will make sure you remember to contact me, so I know you're safe.")

"Hmm," Doctor Smith says. "Try again."

She tries sixteen times. 

It works on try number seventeen, with Doctor Smith's hand wrapped around her bicep. 

&&.

The arcade is loud and noisy and bright, but it seems dull in comparison to the riot playing across Doctor Smith's face. 

" _Together_ ," he breathes, mostly to himself. "Interesting."

&&.

When they hop home, the school has called. 

(She's not quite keen on calling this thing, "hopping," but Doctor Smith is insistent she not call it teleportation.

_It'll draw attention that way. Hop, Rose, hop for your life._ ) 

Her mum had covered for them, said she picked them up. It's a stretch, her mum having driven to Wales to pick up Rose and her new...boyfriend, but they'd apparently bought it no problem. An explosion during a school trip — that Rose is safe at all is probably enough right now. 

It means they have to stay in London though. Neither of them can be spotted back in Wales right now, not without raising questions. 

&&.

Mickey and Shareen come back on the bus the next day, both acting weird and quiet when Rose and Doctor Smith meet them at a chippy near the flat.

Shareen looks _gorgeous_ though, properly movie star gorgeous, and what's weirder is that Mickey seems to be making an effort _not_ to look at her. 

"How'd you get your hair to do that?" Rose asks, gesturing at Shareen's head with a chip. 

Shareen shrugs. "Just, um. I just thought of it, and I did it."

Rose chews on the end of her chip. "Well, yeah, but...like, how? A curling wand? Rollers? You should show my mum, she'd be dead impressed."

Shareen looks at where Doctor Smith's off getting them another round of sodas before turning back to Rose. "I just _thought_ of it, okay?"

Mickey nudges Shareen, a quick nod and a set of angry eyebrows directed her way. 

There's something going on, it's obvious, but Rose can't quite put her finger on it. 

They probably shagged.

Doctor Smith comes back to the table, passing the Cokes out, and they all take long awkward, long sips. 

Well, except for Doctor Smith, he seems to be genuinely enjoying his drink, seems to be genuinely enjoying _life_ , especially for a bloke who found himself teleported — _hopped_ — to another country, only to spend the night on Jackie Tyler's questionable sofa. 

"So...." Mickey says, drawing the word out. "You and Rose, huh?"

Doctor Smith startles, but recovers quickly. "Oh, uh. Yep!" With stilted movements, he puts his arm around Rose where she's seated next to him in the booth. 

They'd decided late yesterday evening that it was best to stick with the new boyfriend thing — it's the easiest way to account for them being nearly inseparable right now — the "first blush of a new romance," Doctor Smith had said. 

Rose had called him weird, and ignored the part of her that was secretly chuffed at dating a _doctor_. A _handsome_ doctor.

"How'd that happen?" Mickey's watching them critically. 

Doctor Smith scratches at the back of his head. "Ah, you know, shared trauma...brings people together...the explosion....uh"

Rose sees her opening. "Yeah, like you and Shareen, Mickey."

Shareen physically recoils, skittering as far across the booth as she can without landing on the floor. "No, no, no, not like me and Mickey."

"Well, then why are you two being so weird?"

Before either of them can answer, the bell on the door is jingling and Adam Mitchell's on his way to the counter.

He spots their booth and diverts his path. "Nice work on the bus, Smith."

Next to her, Doctor Smith shifts like he's going to answer and Rose nudges him, whispering, "Mickey's last name is Smith, too."

"Oh."

"Yeah, thanks, mate," Mickey says, barely glancing at Adam.

"How'd you do that anyway? Didn't know you were mechanically inclined."

"He literally works at a mechanic's, Adam," Shareen says, annoyed. 

“Yeah, but as an errand boy," Adam says.

"Must've picked up a few things, huh?" Mickey's refusing to meet Adam's eye. To anyone else, he would look but dismissive, but to Rose he looks...nervous.

"But a _bus_ engine?" Adam's insistent, pressing. 

Mickey shrugs. 

"Hey, mate, why don't you take a walk?" Doctor Smith says, drawing four surprised stares. "I'm working on making a good impression on the friends here, yeah?" He tightens his arm around Rose's shoulders and nods across the table at Mickey and Shareen. 

It's the most...normal she's heard Doctor Smith sound, he almost sounds like a regular bloke, instead of the barmy scientist she now shares, like, superpowers with. 

"And who are you?" Adam says, nearly sneering. It's clear from his expression that he doesn't recognize Doctor Smith from Wales. 

"I'm the Doctor," he says. 

" _The_ Doctor?"

"Yep."

"That's what people call you."

"Yep."

"Doctor of what?"

Rose jumps in, spotting an opportunity to scare Adam off. "Oh, a little of this and a little of that, right, Doctor? He, um...makes people better. Makes 'em feel _good_." She ends with a deliberate little laugh, like they're in on a joke.

Adam's eyes go wide, just as Rose had expected — now he thinks the Doctor is a drug dealer and won't come near him. It's always hilarious when formerly posh kids move to the estate, but they've been milking Adam's discomfort for _years_ now. 

"Right," Doctor Smith — the Doctor — says, winking at Rose in a way that manages to be both lewd and cheesy. 

Adam skitters away, right out the door without any food. 

"So," the Doctor says, tone and manner snapping back into place. "You fixed a bus engine."

Mickey shrugs, drawing a cold chip through a spatter of vinegar. 

Shareen makes a noise, getting Mickey's attention. "I think we can tell them," Shareen mumbles. 

"No, I don't even _know_ that bloke," Mickey whispers back, heated.

"He's a scientist, maybe he knows what's happening."

"Yes," the Doctor says. "He _does_ know what's happening — two people are assuming that because they're whispering, other people can't hear them." He lowers his voice, the next bit coming out soft and quiet. "I can whisper, too."

Rose snickers. 

"Fine," Shareen says to Mickey. "Then at least I'm showing them mine." She turns to Rose. "Rose, what color do you think would look nice on my nails?"

She fans her hand out on the table, spreading her fingers apart and confusing Rose. 

"What?" Rose says.

"My nails," Shareen insists. "What color should I do them?"

"Oh. Um."

"Blue!" the Doctor says gamely. "Do them blue."

Shareen nods in acknowledgement and then stares at her hand, concentrating. As Rose watches, blue blooms on Shareen's nails, taking over the pink steadily until each finger is tipped by a perfect coat of polish. 

"What?" Rose says, at the time the Doctor says, " _Brilliant_."

"It's not just my nails," Shareen says, keeping her voice low, but no longer bothering to whisper. "It's _everything_. Watch." She widens her eyes and Rose stares at them, the irises turning from brown to purple to green. "This is just the small stuff."

Next to her, the Doctor removes his arm from around Rose's shoulder and picks up one of Shareen's hands, inspecting the nails and polish as he cups her fingers gently. Rose's jaw tightens at the sight and Mickey smirks.

The Doctor is hardly her real boyfriend, hardly even her real friend, but what he'd said earlier, about shared trauma or whatever, it feels true, she feels linked to him somehow. 

Although...they haven't tested it much, maybe it's down to him, and not her. 

"Nando's!" Rose blurts out, and the Doctor's eyes widen in fright as Shareen swings her gaze toward Rose. 

Neither of them disappear though. 

"Did you think of Nando's?" Rose asks, unable to keep the urgency from her voice.

"Yeah," Shareen says. "Why?"

The Doctor sets Shareen's hand back down and turns to Rose. "It's just you... _us_ ," he says quietly. "I'm positive."

"Right," she says,  a tingle of embarrassment fluttering across the back of her neck. 

Shareen watches both of them carefully, her green eyes shifting back to brown. 

Rose and the Doctor sit perfectly still, apparently _too_ still, because suddenly Shareen slaps the table. "Oh my god, you guys have one, too!"

"What?" Rose says, even though she knows what's happened, knows they've been caught. 

"A _power_ ," Shareen hisses. "I thought we were the only ones."

"We?" the Doctor says, but his eyes are already on Mickey.

"Fine," Mickey grumbles. "I guess I can...sort of...talk to machines now."

"You can _talk_ to them?" the Doctor says, but his voice isn't mocking, it's interested. 

"Not exactly, but it's the closest I can explain. I just see how things work now, I know how to fix them. It's like they guide me or something. They help me."

"That's how you fixed the bus?" Rose asks. 

"That's how I fixed the bus." Mickey sounds almost forlorn. 

"What is it?" Rose puts her hand over Mickey's briefly and is pleased to see the Doctor's eyebrows draw down in response. Maybe it's not just her that's making more of all this already. 

"It's just...now I'm sort of freak. Still got no qualifications, what am I gonna tell the lads down the garage? 'I was in an explosion, let me have a crack at that Jaguar?'"

Shareen gives him a sympathetic pat, but it only lasts a second and then she's wheeling back to Rose and the Doctor. 

"All right," she says. "What have you guys got?"

"Ours is, like, joint," Rose says, and then looks quickly to the Doctor, worried she shouldn't have said anything. 

He shrugs lightly, gesturing with his palms up, as if the floor is hers. 

"But what _is_ it?" Shareen says. 

"We can...well. We can _hop_ to other places."

"Hop? What's that mean?" Mickey's brow is furrowed. "Like bunnies?"

The Doctor laughs, but it's got a mocking tone. "Yes, Mickey, like _bunnies_."

Rose rolls her eyes. "More like — teleportation." She whispers the last bit, mindful of the Doctor's hesitation to use that word. 

"Oh, sod off," Shareen says. "What is it really?"

"It's really that," Rose insists. 

"Prove it."

Rose grabs the Doctor's wrist and imagines them in Shareen's bedroom. In a matter of moments, they've popped in, snatched up the raggedy Paddington that sits on her bed, and popped back. 

"Paddy!" Shareen yelps, snatching the stuffed bear and shoving it into her purse. "Oh my god. Oh my god, you were telling the truth."

Rose beams, shifting to look at the Doctor.

He looks furious.

"You can't just do that! They'll be looking for us, looking for _me_ , and you're just popping us in and out of chippies easy as you please."

A wave of shame blankets Rose. It's more than that she's been told off — she feels like she's disappointed him. 

"Sorry," she mumbles. 

"Why would they be looking for you?" Mickey says. 

"Oh, I don't know, _Rickey_ , because I disappeared yesterday and they haven't seen me since?"

Mickey shakes his head. "No, but it's more than that, isn't it? You know something. You _work_ for that place."

For the first time since she shook him awake in the auditorium, Rose realizes she doesn't know much about the Doctor at all. They'd had that first hop and that was that — she's been going along with him since. 

But Mickey's right, he _did_ work there and some of the things he's said, things she let pass...what if this was all on purpose? 

He was speaking, right at the front of the whole talk, he could be their bloody leader for all she knows. 

"Rose," the Doctor says softly, and she realizes she's been inching away from him. 

"Do you?" she presses. "Do you know what's going on? You said there were tests, people moving across the lab —"

He shifts uncomfortably, scratching at the back of his head. "I...have some ideas."

Shareen rolls her eyes, now a vaguely unsettling dark pink color. "You're all being dramatic, this is not a problem, this is a solution."

"To what?" Mickey says, and he still sounds a bit miserable about all of this, that this is something he has to deal with in his life now. 

"To our futures, you knob!" Shareen cuffs him lightly on the shoulder. "I don't know what your plans were, but this will bloody well make them easier."

Mickey pouts and for a moment Rose forgets to be angry with the Doctor, focused instead on comforting Mickey.

"Think of it this way, Micks," she says, "what's your Xbox? It's like the oldest one, right?"

"It's a 360, actually, ta," he defends. 

"Oh, right, how could I forget — cost me my Valentine's Day dinner, that did." Next to her, the Doctor snorts, as if he's not skating on even thinner ice, turning her into a bloody science experiment. "But there's already a newer one, isn't there? Now you can just talk to it, and it'll tell you how to upgrade it."

Mickey's head tilts, like he's considering. "I guess I didn't think about it like that. That's all right then, isn't it?" He sounds pleased.

Instead of a snort, the Doctor scoffs this time. "You've been given a gift that the rest of the world can only dream of and you're going to use it on _video games_?" 

"Is that what this is, mate? A _gift_?"

The Doctor looks to Rose for help, a look that says he needs help translating for more...simple minds, but Rose doesn't give him an inch. 

"Yeah, you should probably explain yourself, Doctor," she says. " _Now_."

He glances around the chippy, clearly looking for an excuse, but it's empty, even the counter girl is out of earshot, perched on a stool and thumbing through her phone. 

"It — it wasn't supposed to go like this," he says. "The whole thing was my idea, look for students somewhere new, find untapped potential..."

"...turn them into freaks," Rose finishes. 

"No." The Doctor is adamant. "Turn them into _scientists_."

"What?" Mickey and Shareen join in, the word coming from all three of them in chorus. 

"We're a lab, a medical science lab, we recruit from all the top universities, but we...well, we know earlier than uni, um, who we're going to want. It's always the same kids, kids from wealthy families, posh kids with the same narrow-minded view of the world. I thought — if we looked elsewhere."

"So...what? Round up poor kids? Cross your fingers for Good Will Hunting?" Mickey says, and Rose wishes for a second that Adam was back, just to hear Mickey call them poor.

"Not exactly, but...not exactly _not_ exactly, um, yeah?" The Doctor tugs at his ear. "There were some labs scheduled for after the lecture, a sort of...test. A Kobayashi Maru."

"What?"

"Can you all stop doing that in unison like that? It's creepy."

He's met with three identical stares. 

"All right, well, we were just going to see who thought differently, we certainly weren't anticipating anything like..." he trails off, gesturing vaguely at the way Shareen's made her eyes orange. 

"But what were you even working on that," Rose gestures similarly at Shareen, " _that_ was a possibility?"

The Doctor shrugs. "Unlocking a few things in the human...base code. Things we could use to cure cancer, disabilities, even poverty."

"And now you've turned the lot of us into _this_ instead?" Rose asks.

"No, no," the Doctor is insistent. "I think it's just you — well, just _us_."

"What? Why would you think that?"

The Doctor shrugs. "There were 300 students in that auditorium, if all of them had, ehm, powers, we'd have heard about it."

Rose raises her eyebrows in disbelief, it's clear now that the Doctor hasn't been very forthcoming at all, even if his heart _appears_ to have been in the right place. 

"I'm serious, we'd know," he insists. "Your mate Adam, would he be the type to keep something like that to himself? Here, Rickey — _Mickey_. Can you get your phone out?"

Mickey shifts, pulling his phone from his pocket. 

"Brilliant, now ask it to search the internet. Mentions of super powers, kids with new abilities, stuff like that."

Mickey laughs. "It's not that kind of phone."

The Doctor persists. "It is now. _Talk_ to it."

"Oh," Mickey says, realization dawning. He stares at the phone, the little screen above the touchpad, and suddenly it's overtaken with rapid fire images, webpages flickering by in milliseconds, images and text scrolling faster than Rose can track them. 

After a minute, Mickey looks up. "Nothing."

"See?" the Doctor says. "Just you. Us."

"Why?" Rose asks. "Everyone in there experienced the...flash explosion thing. Why just us?"

The Doctor says. "I've been trying to figure that out myself. It must've reacted with something in our unique body chemistry. Did you do anything special? Have breakfast together? Anything the rest of your class wouldn't have had?"

Rose feels her cheeks heat up as she realizes what they'd done in the back of the bus, what they hadn't shared with anybody. 

"Um," she says. "Alcohol."

"What?" the Doctor.

"Vodka," she says sheepishly. "Well, and Ribena."

The Doctor looks puzzled for a second and then sighs. "Ohhhh."

"But you weren't there," Rose says.

"No," he agrees. "But my friend  _did_ get engaged that morning and insisted I toast with her. You ever have champagne with Weetabix? _Disgusting_."

"Oh my god, your friend must be affected, too, do you need to call her?" Rose is suddenly worried about this friend of his. She must be scared or —

"Ah, no, no, Donna wasn't there, it was more of a virtual toast. She's in Japan, made me get Skype on everything before she'd tell me. You know she'd hidden the bottle of champagne in my fridge months ago for exactly that reason? She's brilliant."

Rose grins, imagining the chaos the Doctor's fridge must be if he didn't notice an entire bottle of champagne. 

"Anyway," he continues, "even if she were in the country, Donna wouldn't come near the lab if you paid her. Says Rassilon — that's my boss — gives her the creeps. "

"That the bloke from the front row?"

The Doctor furrows his brow. "Yeah...how did you know that?"

"Saw him cut you off when you started to ramble."

He's looking at her like she's something new, something curious, but the expression clears quickly. "Ah, well, yeah, he didn't think this was a good idea. Thought we should've stuck with the —"

"Rich kids," Shareen supplies.

"Yeah."

"Probably should've," Rose says. "I don't think any of us would've passed your Kobashi —"

"Kobayashi Maru."

"Yeah, that."

"I think you're underestimating yourself, Rose Tyler."

The way he says her name, the quiet confidence in her, it's...nice. He can't be much older than her, certainly doesn't look it, but it's nice, this kind of faith. 

"And you're — what? Some kind of genius? Because you look awfully young to be _giving_ the tests, instead of taking them."

He shrugs, holding up his thumb and index finger with a gap between them. "Little bit of a genius." As she watches, he widens the gap and winks at her. "More than a little."

"All right, genius," she says. "And what are we gonna do now? Just go back to school like nothing's happened?"

"For now, sort of, yeah, it's near end of term anyway, right?" he says. "You two —" he points at Shareen and Mickey "— keep it quiet, or someone might dissect you."

Mickey looks nauseated, Shareen has moved onto staring at her nails, shifting them to a swirly rainbow of colors. 

"And you," the Doctor says, looking at Rose, "you'll have to come with me."

"What? Why?"

He shifts, clearly uncomfortable. "These, um. These powers, they weren't assigned randomly. Look, see, Mickey works at a mechanic, right? And now he can speak to machines. Shareen, I bet you always liked make up, playing with your appearance, stuff like that? I'm right, aren't I?"

Shareen nods. 

"And Rose, you wanted to travel, didn't you?"

Rose bites at the edge of her thumb. "Well, yeah, but everybody does, right?"

"Oh, no, no, not like you. Not like this, you'd have to feel that in your _bones_ for this to happen."

Mickey gives her a sad, lopsided smile and she knows it's true — knows she's been talking about leaving the estate for as long as she can remember. 

"What about you then? Why's mine attached to you?" she asks.

"I..." He clears his throat. "I may be, just the slightest, tiniest bit, with Donna gone now, and, um, well, that is to say...I'm possibly quite...lonely?"

Rose's heart expands, sending heat to every inch of her body, as she's overcome with an urge to protect him. 

It's mental, he's got at least half a foot and probably two stone on her, she's only just met him, and he turned her into a bloody superhero. 

Well, super _person_. 

She has no idea how to even begin to protect him, but...she _can_ stay with him. Just for a little bit, just until science itself stops marking him as lonely. 

"Oh," she says. "Right, well, I guess that makes sense. I'll, uh — do you wanna go back to Wales?"

He shrugs, but there's an impish look on his face. "Don't you think we ought to have a little fun first?"

&&. 

They tell her mum that...frankly she doesn't know _what_ they tell her mum, because it's mostly him. Mostly just the Doctor and some impressive words, "research assistant" and "school credit" and "I'll keep her safe."

Rose isn't sure how much is true and how much is pure bollocks, but he assures her that his lab holds a lot of sway, that he really can get her some academic distinction for traveling with him, and when he follows it up with a few e-mails on her ancient computer, that's enough for her. 

They're really only limited by Rose's imagination, so they run down the usual suspects — Paris, Rome, Disney World, New York, Hollywood — places she's seen on the telly and in movies, places she's able to get a good mental picture of to hop them to. 

(The first time they need to get a room for the night, Rose clenches her fingers tight around her bag, unwilling to run herself into debt for this bloke, not after what she'd learned with Jimmy. 

Instead he winks at her and asks the front desk for a brochure, spinning a tale of their upcoming honeymoon, the one they're saving and saving and saving for. 

He ducks them into a hallway, holds the brochure open with one hand, holds her hand with the other, and soon she's hopped them to the nicest suite in the hotel. 

They have to stay quiet, no room service, no stomping around, but when she gets hungry, he holds her hand again and they hop for pizza, for ice cream, for a bottle of champagne.)

She's beginning to feel giddy with the possibilities — with the Doctor by her side, they can go anywhere and do anything and be anybody. 

Or, well, _almost_ anybody. Because a fake boyfriend isn't the same as a real boyfriend, no matter how much she's starting to wish it were. 

She's his girlfriend in name only, and while they hold hands everywhere and constantly, it always stops there. 

They've been together two months when that becomes a problem. 

&&.

"Uh, Rose?" The Doctor's still holding her hand, the air around them still shimmering with the hop, as he shifts to take in their surroundings.

"Yeah?" she says, pretending she can't see what's happened, didn't know know exactly what she'd done the second she'd done it. 

"Where...are...we?" 

The room — the _restaurant_ — is dim, shadows and candlelight and cozy little tables. It's easily the most romantic place she's ever seen, which makes sense, because it's precisely what she'd seen right before she hopped them. 

They were meant to be off scuba diving, headlong into another adventure, and she'd thought — just for a moment — what if they went somewhere, did something, that left them sweaty and panting for different reasons?

_Shagging_ reasons. 

That one little slip of control and now she's not even entirely sure where they are, just some platonic ideal of a romantic restaurant. 

(Or, well, what she _thinks_ a platonic ideal is. He's constantly teaching her things and she absorbs most of it, really she does, but sometimes he wears _glasses_ and sometimes the tendons in his neck move a certain way and he always smells _so_ good, how does he smell so good?)

"I don't know," she says.

"But you...brought us here. How do you not know?" His voice is curious, the same way he always asks questions about how her half of the power works. In her darker moments she wonders if she's not just some fleeting experiment to him. 

She shrugs. "I was just thinking, it's sort of our — it's our anniversary. Been doing this two months now, and I thought, well, where do people celebrate anniversaries? And then I thought: nice restaurants."

He grins and straightens his tie, unruffled by the change of plans. "Lead on then, Rose Tyler."

They're seated at a table set back in a little alcove, getting lucky when the hostess speaks English and responds well to a slickly-palmed 20. 

They'd finally figured out the money thing a couple weeks back — he'd had her hop them into a bank vault, and it was probably a sign of her trust in him that she'd immediately done it. 

Then they'd borrowed a little initial capital and skipped off to Vegas — _counting cards isn't technically illegal, Rose_. 

One low-cut dress for her, a couple good runs for him, and they'd cashed out well ahead before Sin City knew what hit it. (Or, he explained, depending on the count, what _didn't_ hit it.)

It was quick work to return the start up money back to the vault, and they've been living off the profits ever since. 

It's a weird feeling, having money, possibly even weirder than being able to teleport. A superpower (or whatever this is) always seemed so unlikely, so outlandish, that it was easy to imagine all the fantastic things she'd do with one. But money — money was grounded in her reality. 

Now, to have it, to walk into a place like this and _belong_...she's not entirely come to grips with it. 

Luckily the Doctor has, and tonight he pulls out her chair, helps her with the menu, and orders the wine — all in all, it feels like a date. One of those mid-relationship type dates where they already know all about each other, but they're still not sure where things are going. 

She's only really had that experience a couple of times, and the answer was always depressing. 

With Jimmy where things were going was _nowhere fast_ , and with Mickey, it was _nowhere exciting_. 

But what about the Doctor — has he done this much? Or ever?

"Had a lot of anniversaries?" she asks, trying to pretend the question is casual as she reaches for a piece of bread. 

"Hmm?" The Doctor, for his part, is on his third piece of bread, and his answer is muffled mid-chew.

"Like with women...or men? Dates? Anniversaries?" She carefully rips a corner of the roll off, looking at him thoughtfully before lifting it to her mouth.

He swallows, washing things down with a big gulp of wine. "Uh, yep. Er, nope? Fair amount, I guess. What's a lot?"

She thinks of her own history. "More than twice?"

"Oh, then nope."

She nods and takes a sip of her own wine, it's good, it seems nice, not that she has much to compare it to. 

"So...Mickey and who else?" he asks. 

"What?"

"Well, I assume 'twice' was your personal benchmark, so...Mickey and who else?" He finishes his roll, dabbing at his mouth with a napkin in a way that is literally unlike anything she's seen him do before. It seems sort of forced.

"How do you know I dated Mickey?"

"Er, because you said it, you and your mum, right after the first hop.

“That was months ago!”

“Yeah,” he says, “ _two_ months ago, that’s what this anniversary dinner is for…?”

“But how do you remember that? We’d barely known each other five minutes.”

He lifts a shoulder, eyeing the last roll in the basket until she shoves it toward him. He picks it up gleefully and then pauses to rip it in two, depositing the other half back in the basket and grinning at her. 

She's not going to get an answer out of him, just like she never gets an answer out of him about this stuff. He'll talk for England about the periodic table or Charles Dickens or bloody fairy cake decorations, but you ask him what made him buy her a rose in front of the Eiffel Tower and he just shoves a roll in his mouth. 

Instead, she answers him. "A bastard."

"What?"

"Mickey and a bastard named Jimmy."

"Oh."

"Yeah." 

They finish every last bit of bread on the table before Rose works up the nerve to ask the question pressing against her tongue.

"Who are your two?"

For a moment, she thinks he might answer, his face turns contemplative and he stares at the tablecloth. 

Then, "Ah, let's just say I'm probably the bastard."

She doesn't ask again.

&&.

There’s a hop back to her mum’s, and there’s a party. 

They land at night to the thump-thump-thump of bass and the smell of alcohol, all the furniture in the flat pushed to the edges. 

Mickey’s got his arm around a girl and Shareen — beautiful, _gorgeous_ Shareen — is surrounded by a group of blokes, and it’s only overwhelming when Rose realizes she feels like she’s visiting. 

The Doctor holds her hand and it feels like a safety net, like she can leave if she wants, and like choosing to stay _means_ something, even if it’s only for the night. 

It means she’s not changed, not like her mum accuses of her when the wine bottles start going empty and the neighbors start going home.

“Mickey’s managing the shop,” her mum says. 

“I heard.”

“And Shareen’s going to be in a new Henrik’s advert.”

“I heard.” Rose bites at the skin of her thumb, glancing around to try and find the Doctor before her mum gets to the point, because it’s coming. It’s coming like a great bloody freight train.

“And you, you’re _leaving_ again.”

“And?”

“And you don’t have to, Rose. Whatever this Doctor’s put into your head, what’s it mean in the end?”

“Twenty-six.”

“What?”

“That’s the number of countries I’ve been to in the last three months.”

“And where will you go when he’s gone, when he’s picked up some new ‘research assistant?’ And don’t think I don’t know what _that_ means.”

“It’s not — we’re not —” Rose tries to protest, but she’s finally spotted the Doctor, he’s being interrogated by Mrs. Coopman, the same one who’d been after Rose all night to hear all about her new bloke, and Rose realizes her lies are intersecting. 

“I can’t do this now, Mum. I’m _happy_. The Doctor…he’s, he’s showing me a better way to live. There’s so much out there to see, and I’m _seeing_ it. Don’t you want that for me?”

There’s a long moment, quiet and drawn out in the middle of a too-loud party, her mum’s gaze fixed on her in the same way that used to have Rose spilling her insides like marbles. It’s the look that got her to confess to sleeping with Jimmy, to confess to dating Mickey, to confess she was considering dropping out. 

But there’s nothing to confess now, and Mrs. Coopman stumbles toward them, interrupting their conversation and taking Rose’s chin between her fingers. 

“You’ve got a good one there,” Mrs. Coopman says, gesturing with her free hand toward the Doctor. 

“I really do,” Rose says, but Mrs. Coopman’s tripping away and Rose’s eyes haven’t left her mum’s. 

There’s another moment of silence, and then a breath, and then a hug. 

“I hope so, sweetheart.”

&&.

They begin to assemble a home, of sorts. Places they return to over and over again for all types of purposes, like making a flat out of the entire world. 

They shower in America, some plush Californian spa where the attendants are too worried about offending possible celebrities to ever ask much about them.

They lounge in Amsterdam, thick, heady smoke and deep, soft sofas, the Doctor murmuring in her ear about everything and nothing as the sun sinks in the sky.

They sleep in Italy, two beds in a room at a bed and breakfast where the owner thinks they’re angels and her son thinks they’re magic. (And they are, a bit, Rose thinks.)

They eat…in England. 

Jackie Tyler’s kitchen for Sunday roast and afternoon tea and breakfast with all the trimmings. It’s not every meal and it’s not every day, but when one of them suggests popping home for a cuppa, it’s there that they mean. 

Her mum comes around on the Doctor and the Doctor comes around on her mum and they both know and neither lets on. 

It’s in that kitchen that her mum is presented with her first mobile, a fancy, smart thing with international calling and international data. They text her photos from everywhere, the bright lights of Tokyo, the ski slopes of Utah, fossils outside Johannesburg. 

They get a text on the steps of the Great Wall of China, asking why they’re never in the photos themselves. Before Rose can even finish reading it, the Doctor’s slinging an arm around Rose’s shoulders, mugging for the camera. 

It’s the start of something then — photo after photo of the two of them, smiling, sweaty, beaming for the camera. Photos he takes of her and photos she takes of him, photos taken by other travelers with shaky hands and misfired flashes. 

On nights when Rose can’t sleep, the Doctor snoring away in his bed across from her own in the middle of bloody _Italy_ , she turns on her phone, and she thumbs through them all. 

She can always see it then, the look on her face in brightly lit pictures and the look on her face reflected back in the glass — she’s in love with him, she knows. 

&&.

In the middle of the Australian Outback, they find out there's a recharge period.

They've gotten a little freer with their hops, charging into places based only on the strength of an internet search or an issue of National Geographic bought from a rummage sale.

(They visit a _lot_ of rummage sales — the Doctor always scouring for bits and bobs and once a bloody _coat_. Rose likes them more than she lets on, but mostly because they involve a lot of old ladies cooing over what a handsome young couple they make.)

Today though, they land in sweltering heat, surrounded by unforgiving terrain and animals Rose recognizes from nature programs. They don't even bother to drop their joined hands, instead sharing a look that has Rose trying to hop them away in a matter of seconds.

It doesn't work. 

She tries again, concentrating harder on her mental picture of a crystal blue pool surrounded by lounge chairs. 

Still no. 

The Doctor squeezes her hand. "Rose?" he murmurs, trying not to draw the attention of anything...any _one_.

"It's not working," she hisses back. 

"Try some place easy."

She pictures her bedroom back in London, the pink walls and the messy floor, every detail crisp and clear, and tries to hop them.

Nothing. 

"It's not working," she says again, dropping his hand and cracking her knuckles, trying to reset the connection, something, _anything_. 

There's no _immediate_ threat, but it's hot and uncomfortable and any one of the animals she sees could _become_ an immediate threat. 

He picks her hand back up, poking and prodding at her palm with cool, gentle fingertips. He traces his index finger up the inside of her forearm, following the faint blue of a vein and making her work to hold back a shudder. 

"Thoughts?" she asks. 

"What's that bit from The IT Crowd? You don't turn off and turn on again, do you?"

She cuts him a look. "Not like that."

He tilts his head. "Like what th...ohhhhhh."

She huffs out a laugh. "Yeah. So you let me know if you want to try that."

He glances around them, staring at the ground for a long moment as if he's considering it. 

"We'll call that the back up plan," he finally says and she can't tell if he's serious or not. 

"And what's the primary plan?"

He shrugs. "Think we're just gonna have to wait."

It takes 28 minutes and a joke about a trouser snake. 

They do not get to the back up plan. 

&&. 

As beaches go, this is the nicest one she's hopped them to. They haven't tried anything open-ended in weeks, since Australia really, but a nice, glossy photo in a travel shop window seemed like a safe enough bet. Can't be sending hapless tourists into danger, after all. 

Unless the danger is nudity, apparently. 

"I...uh," Rose says, cutting herself off when she spots a man running to catch a frisbee, his willy flopping around like a fat little sausage. 

A limp sausage, blessedly, but still.

"Yeah," the Doctor says. 

"Reckon if we walked it, we'd find the _non_ -nude parts?"

"Dunno," he says, distracted.

"Do you wanna just wait the recharge here?"

"Dunno."

Is he — what is he — he's not even paying attention! 

Rose swivels her head in the direction he's looking, expecting to see a young fit woman — hopefully blonde, she's got a hunch and her fingers crossed on his type — but what she sees instead makes her entire body go hot. 

There's a couple, a man and a woman, older than her mum by the looks of the bloke's hair, and they're...

Blimey. 

They're _snogging_. Naked.

"So it's that sort of place then," she breathes. 

Before he can respond, another couple is heading towards them, shouting. 

Rose expects the couple kissing to get yelled at, but this pair sidesteps them neatly, barely even registering them, before barreling up to the Doctor and Rose. 

"No gawking," the bloke chides Rose.

Next to him, the woman waggles a finger at the Doctor. "This isn't a peep show."

“No, no, we’re sorry, bit of a mix up,” the Doctor says. “How far to the, um, the _non_ -nude beach?”

The woman stares at them, sizing them up, and Rose strives to focus on her eyes, they’re a nice blue color. What color blue would she call that? Cerulean? Sky? Aqua? Pink…? Oh, god, nipples, nipples, nipples, eyes up, eyes _up_. 

“It’s about a half hour’s walk that way,” the woman finally says, gesturing over their shoulders. 

“Thirty minutes?” the Doctor asks.

“Yes,” the bloke replies, and, no, no, no, Rose forgot about the bloke, don’t look down, do _not_ look **down**.

“So we either walk across this nude…this _beach_ for thirty minutes, or we _stay_ on this beach for thirty minutes and…what? Join in?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess,” the bloke says, clearly confused by what the Doctor’s laid out as their only options, but Rose isn’t. Thirty minutes until the next hop. Thirty minutes until they can leave.

“Right, well, we’ll just…um. We’ll make a decision and then we’ll go. Or stay,” the Doctor says. “I promise.”

The pair gives them one last hard look, a non-verbal threat to check up on them, and then they turn, skirting the formerly snogging couple, now apparently enjoying their...afterglow on an oversized towel, and heading back toward the water. 

“First timers?” the bloke on the towel says. 

"What?" 

The man stands up, dusting sand off of his bare thighs. "I said, 'first timers?' It can be a little overwhelming when you're just getting started."

"Oh, no, no, no, we're not staying," the Doctor says, and then cuts a look to Rose. "Are we?"

Rose shrugs, because it seems like the safest response. Possibly the _only_ response.

"Uh. Right. We'll just be...figuring that out," the Doctor tells the bloke. 

The man shrugs. "Suit yourself — or don't." He winks.

Before they can respond, the woman from the towel has joined them. "Michael, now is not the time for nudity puns."

She turns to the Doctor and Rose. "He forgets what he was like when we first started. Hid behind a tree for an _hour_."

Rose can't imagine this same bloke, the one naked-snogging with abandon on a semi-crowded beach being embarrassed over nudity, but it _is_ sort of comforting, in a way. 

"Wouldn't recommend that, actually," Michael says. "The water though — that's a good place to... _wade_ in."

He gives the woman a small, smug smile and she shakes her head affectionately. 

"He _is_ right," she says. "If you decide to stay, you can get comfortable in the water first."

"Riiiiight," the Doctor says, glancing toward Rose, clearly expecting to her to make a decision one way or another. 

"Anyway," the woman says, "Enjoy your afternoon!"

With that, she's tugging Michael back over to their towel. 

"What'd you reckon?" Rose says. 

"I don't know." The Doctor is more wrong-footed than she's ever seen him, but she can't tell if it's on her behalf, or his own. 

A couple times at night, when it's been hot in their makeshift bedroom, he's just worn his pants to bed. Thin, clingy boxer briefs and nothing else. It's a lot of skin — _a lot_ — but he's never seemed bothered by it, climbing into his bed across from her own with a happy, oblivious grin. 

Now though...now he's acting like the idea of being naked in front of her is something...more. 

Rose glances out at the water, it's blue and inviting-looking, but she can't tell from here how clear it is, if it would provide much — oh, _fuck it_ , she wants this, she wants to go skinny dipping with the Doctor, she wants to snog him on a towel and shag him in a bed and stay with him forever. 

All this chasing herself around inside her own head is getting exhausting. 

"I'm game if you are," she says, still staring out at the waves. 

"Yeah?" The Doctor's tone changes immediately, it's lighter now, excited, _intrigued_. 

"Yeah." She grabs his hand and tugs him toward the water. "Come on."

They stand just shy of the shoreline and strip off their shoes and socks, curling their toes in the sand. 

The Doctor takes a second to set the timer on his watch, the little electronic beep that will tell them they can hop again, if they want, and then unknots his tie. 

He moves on to his suit jacket and shirt, unbuttoning them and shrugging them off before pulling his t-shirt over his head, too, dropping it all to the sand. 

Pushing through her hesitation, Rose does the same, pulling her shirt off and leaving her in a black bra that could easily be a swimming top, if she were allowed to wear one. 

He gestures at her bra and then back to his own bare chest with a challenging look. She raises her eyebrows at him and then reaches behind herself to undo the clasp. 

There's a moment when her bra is open, but still hanging on by the straps, the cups gaping loosely in front of her breasts and she watches as the Doctor pretends not to look, turns away, and then looks again, all in the span of a few seconds. 

With a breath to steel herself, she shimmies her shoulders and arms, letting the bra slip down until she's standing topless. 

When she sneaks another look at the Doctor, his eyes are cast down, fixed firmly on his trousers, fingers on the button. 

She mirrors his movements on her jeans, prepared to do this bit the same way — one garment at a time, but at the last second, she snags her knickers, too, yanking both things down in one go and struggling out of them before running straight into the water. 

A few moments later, she hears the splash of the Doctor entering the surf behind her and she swims until she can't touch the bottom anymore. Then she turns around to face him, treading water with her head above the ripple of waves. 

He's in far enough that the water is halfway up his stomach, but his splashing has made his chest wet, little droplets that cling to the hair there and glint in the bright sun. 

She's definitely staring, but she must be backlit because he's squinting, not leering, and she takes the time to look at him in a way she's never let herself do back in the bed and breakfast.

He's wiry and pale and freckled, but the muscles in his shoulders...and his arms...and his ribs, it's all defined just enough that she presses her tongue against the back of her teeth, a tiny outlet for a set of urges that are rapidly consuming her.   
   
When he finally catches up to her, he grins before disappearing under the water and it's only then that she realizes, up close like this, it really is quite clear — she can literally see the crack of his bum as he propels himself, which means...oh my _god_. 

With a jolt, she ducks under the water herself, trying to make a moving visual target for all of her important bits. 

The Doctor, though, assumes it's a game, and gives chase, leaving Rose floundering, trying to pull ahead with the confusing (....but not _entirely_ unpleasant) sensation of water rushing by every inch of her bare body. 

When the Doctor finally manages to land a hand on her ankle, he stops, popping back up above the water and she joins him without thinking. 

"That's one," he shouts, a wide smile lighting his face before he takes off to the left, kicking up a huge splash in her direction and hollering that it's her turn.  

She sputters, but takes off after him, and soon they're playing a makeshift game where the primary objective is literally to _touch_ the other person. 

The other _naked_ person.

On her go, she swipes his hair, giving it a little tug, and when they emerge from the water this time, he gleefully awards her two points. 

It becomes clear after a few more rounds that his scoring rubric has to do with how close you’d have to get to touch that particular place, mixed with some degree of…intimacy. 

The time she gets his stomach, with a quick enough pass that she's sure she's only imagining the gritty feeling of wet hair (and the thought of where that hair leads), he pops back out of the water and stares at her for a couple seconds before haltingly awarding her eight points. 

Up until this point, they've both done a bang up of job of not acknowledging how clear the water really is, how when she opens her eyes underneath it, she can see exactly what she's swiping at, and how the same is undoubtedly true for him. 

But now, as they bob in the waves, she tries to mentally focus on adding up all her points, but instead can only think of one thing —

"What's a ten then?" she asks, pushing hair out of her face.

"What?"

"You said that was an eight — what's a ten?"

He glances down, first at himself and then at her chest, and when he looks her in the eye again, he's wearing a decidedly flirty expression. 

"Why? You gonna go for it?"

She tries to shrug, but it's hidden by the way her shoulders keep disappearing under the water. "I don't know, maybe."

"Well, you were awfully close that time — maybe you should try harder."

"Do you want me to? By my count, a ten would put me over a hundred, I'd win." She's happy to be deep enough that she needs to continue treading water, it's giving her something to do with her hands, keeping her in constant motion. 

"I think, Rose Tyler, that if you score a ten, _I'd_ be the real winner."

He ducks back under the water quickly and begins swimming toward her. She tries to skitter backward, but has nothing to push off from and he's gotten a head start. 

He grabs her up, limbs wrapping around her and propelling them both to the surface, everything naked and wet, and, oh god, if he's just taking the piss, she's going to kill him.

This is the sort of stuff he's always doing, these loaded, meaningful, sometimes even sexual things that he just brushes right by, leaving her to wonder if she's reading too much into his behavior. 

(She has a vision of herself hours from now trying to mentally reason away "wet, naked hugging" as platonic, and it's irritating how quickly she imagines succeeding.)

Her feet still don't reach the ground, but his do, leaving them standing in the water, but under his control. 

"I win," he says, voice low and rough in her ear.

"What?"

"I caught you," he says, and she has to concentrate on his words and not just squirming to confirm whether he's hard. She thinks he might be. Well. _Hopes_. 

"So?"

"So," he says, nudging her cheek with his nose. "You're like the snitch, automatic hundred points."

He tightens his limbs. "I win."

She loops her arms around his shoulders, weight buoyed by the water, and he shifts so that his hands are under her thighs as her legs wrap around his waist. 

He's keeping her held high enough that she can't confirm his erection, but her nipples are hard against his chest, and before she can wonder if he feels them, he looks down, a long, slow look at the tops of her breasts above the water and the tips of them underneath it, pressing lightly into his skin. 

"What do you win, Doctor?" She nips at his earlobe, before skirting her lips against his jawline, bussing light, wet kisses as she goes. There's no mistaking what they're doing now, but she's still not sure how far he'll let it go, whether or not he's going to bolt. 

Instead he lets them stand in the water for a few long moments, light, rippling waves breaking against her back as she picks out the voices of other people in the distance, the call of a few birds. 

Then he draws a breath and repeats her actions back to her, tracking a series of kisses along her jaw and creating another sort of game — each of them taking turns nuzzling the other's neck, tasting water and salt and skin until they're face to face, breathing in slow pants that seem counterintuitive to the way her heart is pounding. 

Securing her with just one hand now, his forearm under her bum, he brings his free hand to scrape away the wet strands of hair clinging to her face. 

"Was there a prize?" she asks, rephrasing her question and drawing a finger down one of his sideburns, her other arm still looped loosely around his shoulders. 

"Hmm?"

"For winning. Like in quidditch, a house cup or something."

The conversation they're having, the actual words that make it up, they're so mundane, so ordinary and exactly like a million things they've said before. But it feels so, so different, not just the nudity and the water, but the...tone.

"Cup?" he says, fixing his eyes on hers. 

She nods. 

"All right." He skates the hand lingering near her shoulder down slowly, pushing past the surface of the water until he reaches her breasts. Then he gently, slowly, cups one of them in his hand. 

Oh, god. 

"Cup," he says again, his voice low and gravely and a smug little smile curling the corners of his lips. 

Rather than comment, because they joke all the time, banter near constantly, but this — _this_ — is new, she arches her back a bit, pushing further into his hand. He takes the hint, gripping her tighter, massaging the soft flesh and sending sizzling heat straight to her stomach, and lower. 

His fingers find her nipple, tracing the puckered skin, rolling it between his fingertips, light pinching and light tugging and something between a moan and a squeak pushes itself out of her mouth. 

He's been watching his hand work, and she has, too, but the noise causes both of them to look up, their eyes meeting. 

When he opens his mouth to speak, to undoubtedly backpedal because there's so much precedent to his retreats, she shakes her head. 

"No," she mumbles. 

His hand freezes. "No?"

She shakes her head again, agitated at being misunderstood, at his hand pulling away from her skin, at the distance he's already creating between their bodies. 

"No, I mean _yes_ ," she says. "Yes, yeah, yes, _please_."

Carefully, slowly, his hand closes the few inches to grip her breast again, and then she's nudging his head with her hand in his hair, urging him closer and closer, until finally she's kissing him.

Despite the water everywhere, the salt has already dried his lips and she can taste it, the tang of the ocean as she swipes at him, just the very tip of her tongue as their mouths work against each other.

His hand drops from her breast again, but this time it's to pull her closer, to re-wrap both of his arms around her before parting his lips against hers. 

In one confident movement his tongue is pushing into her mouth, a wet, slow stroke that she accepts greedily, chasing after him until there's no pattern at all, just their tongues tumbling from one mouth to the other, slick and grainy and wet and hot, their lips re-aligning to open wider, to kiss deeper. 

Her hands tangle in the wet strands of his hair, slicking through them until she finds purchase and tightens, wrenching herself closer to him. 

His grip hastens to match hers and then her legs are wrapped so tightly around him, she's clinging to him, everything feels so urgent, she wants to be closer, she wants to touch him, she wants him inside of her and above her and —

_beep- **beep** beep- **beep** beep- **beep**_

She's built up a reflex from times they've needed the alarm, where as soon as she hears his watch, she hops them somewhere safe. This is what she does now, thinking instantly of their room, and specifically her bed, where they land in a wet, naked heap on top of the quilts.

"Uhh," she says, ready to apologize, to hop them back for their clothes or to continue or to —

"Brilliant," he breathes, interrupting her train of thought and smiling at her in a way that's equal parts proud and predatory. 

Then he swoops back down to kiss her again, the shape of his lingering grin evident against her lips. 

They're still mostly in the same position they were in the ocean, her clinging to him, but now she's flat on her back and without the water to hold her up, he's caught between her thighs, pressing against her center with the force of gravity. 

He's so fucking hard and the angle is off just enough that it nearly hurts, leaving her shifting her hips to try and fix it. Not to put him inside her, not yet, but just to get him...situated, to get the friction right. 

She can tell the second she gets it, not only because it feels amazing, but because his lips stall against her own, and he huffs out a laughing little groan. 

"I'm sorry," he says, and every single neuron and blood vessel and _atom_ that makes up her body tenses, adrenaline flooding her system in a panic. 

"What?" she says, trying to shift him off of her, but only succeeding in teasing her clit with the underside of his cock. She forces herself to focus. "Why are you sorry?"

"For keeping us from _this_ ," he says, punctuating the final word with a slow arch of his hips. 

"I — oh god, I want to talk about this, I really do," she says. "But can we just...can we...? Later?"

"Yeah," he says, in that same incredulous, happy, _breathy_ tone he's been using since this all began.

He moves his mouth to her neck, licking and sucking and biting for several long, squirming moments until he finally pulls away, smacking his lips. 

"Quite salty," he says, nudging her nose with his own. "Might be salty...elsewhere?"

She raises her eyebrows, trying to figure out what he means, because if it's — 

"I can see the wheels turning up there, Rose Tyler. I mean all the salt water, might make it uncomfortable."

"Oh."

"Yeah, so we should probably clean up."

And with that, he's shifting down her body. 

" _Oh_ ," she says again, as he spreads her legs wide with his hands. 

He licks at her, long and slow, and then smacks his lips once more. "I'll have this cleaned up in a jiffy."

"A jiffy?" she says, trying to tease him, but it's too much, he's already set to his task and he murmurs his assent against her clit before swiping at it with his tongue. 

His technique is wet and deep, nearly the same way he's been kissing her mouth, but without any of the urgency. He seems content to lap at her slowly, pushing his tongue inside of her only to pull it back out and drag it up to her clit, over and over again, until finally she fists her hands in his hair, pleading with him in broken words, faster or harder, something, anything, _more_. 

He continues the same lazy pace, licking at her as he stares at her across the expanse of her stomach, the rounds of her breasts. His eyebrows are raised like he's asking her something, expecting a particular thing, and when she finally stutters out a _please_ , he grins and gives in. 

It's so quick then, everything she wants, all presented in rapid succession, he slips a finger inside of her, not too deep, just enough, and then begins a steady, frantic rhythm on her clit, little spikes of pressure building and building until her legs are tensing, one of her hands still fisted in his hair while the other squeezes at her breast, pulling at her nipple haphazardly. 

When he finally presses his finger all the way in, she comes, her back rocketing off the bed until she's half-sitting and both of her hands are at his shoulders, trying to push him away and keep him in place all at the same time. 

He works her down slowly, still pumping his finger inside of her, lapping lightly at her clit, until her own movements gain some trajectory and she's squirming away. 

Pulling back, he bites hard at the inside of her thigh, smearing his mouth against the skin there, but he makes no move to shift up her body. 

"You know, you've made quite a mess down here, Rose. All my hard work, undone."

He says it in his scientist voice, the one he uses when he's telling her about photosynthesis or anemia or some other blasted thing, but this time he's dragging a finger against her wet, still-faintly-pulsing center, and she shudders. 

(Pavlovian response, that's another Doctor thing, and she'll never hear the scientist voice without dampening her knickers again.) 

He pops his finger in his mouth, licking it clean before finally rejoining her at the head of the bed. 

He's barely in position before she's reaching between them, grabbing his cock and giving it a light, squeezing stroke. 

She's a little more clear-headed now, if not totally boneless, and manages to put together a sentence. 

"Isn't this salty, too?" she asks, squeezing again and earning herself a grunt out of him. 

"Yeah, probably," he squeaks out. 

"Better clean that, too, then, yeah?"

He nods, burying his face against her neck as he continues pressing into her hand. 

"Here," she says, nudging at his shoulder. "Roll over."

He complies without protest, rolling onto his back on the other side of the mattress. She shifts to kneel between his legs, and the quilt is wet with ocean water under her hands, everything damp and slightly cool, but when she catches sight of his cock bobbing toward his stomach, a little drop of precome leaking from the tip, she forgets about it entirely. 

She ducks low, dragging her tongue up the underside of his cock lightly, her hand wrapped loosely around the base to steady it. She repeats the motion several times, licking at the sides, the top, the tip, pulling away to taste the salt on her tongue each time. 

He's making pleading little sounds, ones like she'd made earlier, and they explode into stereo when she takes him fully into her mouth. 

She brings her mouth down around him around until her lips meet her fingers and then she sets to a rhythm, up and down, long, slow sucking movements as her tongue still works to swirl around him even with his cock buried in her mouth. 

His hands flutter around her head, seeking permission, and she nods a little, using her free hand to grab one of his and steer it in position. 

He takes to that immediately, brushing at the slowly drying pieces of her hair that are crowding her face, gathering it all up into a loose ponytail in his fist. When she glances up at him, he's looking down at her intently, jaw slack as he watches his cock disappear and reappear between her lips. 

The faster she moves, the needier the noises escaping from his mouth become, and it's as they're reaching a fever pitch that he finally stops her, hand tightening briefly in her hair to get her attention.

"Can we...?" He gestures down toward her body and then back at himself, and she gives him one last long lick before slipping back up the length of his torso, hovering over him on all fours. 

His hands grip her under her bum and for a second there's a bit of upward pressure, like he's going to encourage her to crawl forward, and the image that gives her — the thought of bracing over him while he licks at her like he'd done just minutes ago — it's intense, making her internal muscles clench for something, anything. 

Before she can work up the nerve to act, he's levering himself up, wrapping his arms around her and rolling her until her back is to the mattress. 

It's a little bit of work to switch up their legs, moving hers out so they can bracket his hips, but when he settles again, in the same position they'd landed after the hop, it's perfect — _almost_ perfect. 

But he's not moving. 

"I'm...I'm on the pill," she says, gesturing awkwardly to the little blue pack sitting on the nightstand. 

"I know," he says,

"And clean," she adds. 

"Yeah, me, too."

"So..." She gives him a grin, trying to mitigate whatever's happening inside his head. 

It works, he gives her a smile in return, one that starts small and grows bigger. 

"This is more than I deserve," he says. "Are you sure?"

She wants to nod immediately, but he seems to need a real answer, so she makes herself speak, strong and clear. 

"Yeah," she says. "I'm sure. Are you?"

"Rose Tyler, I am _very_ sure."

She leans up to steal a kiss. "In that case — you'll find your cock between my legs, you may care to move it."

He groans, not a sexual thing — a bad joke thing, but moves his hand to his erection all the same. 

With a slight shift, he's pressing into her entrance, hesitating for just a second and then pushing in further, until he's fully seated and both of them have made noises she doesn't have names for. 

They try kissing, but as soon as he begins to move, it gets lost, instead she's sucking and licking and biting at the skin of his shoulder, the round of muscles and tendons there, as her hands scrape down his back, curl into his bum, anything to encourage him, to make him go faster and harder. 

"I'm not gonna break," she says low in his ear, punctuating the sentence with a nip to his earlobe. 

" _I_ might," he grits out, but picks up his pace, grabbing one of her wandering hands to pin it to the mattress above her head, driving into her harder, the slight change in angle bringing perfect friction to her clit. 

She's getting loud now — "Fuck, god, that feels so good, you feel so good, yeah, oh god, yes, _yes_ — and he's answering in increasingly loud noises, grunts and groans and _Jesus_.

Above them, she flops her pinned hand, working it until she can find his and knit their fingers together, tightening as she gets closer and closer. 

When her teeth find a spot near the base of his neck, and her nails find a spot in the flesh of his arse, he groans so violently that something in her snaps, chasing that sound right into her own orgasm, the feeling crashing over her as she keens underneath him. 

She manages to grit out a few stuttering encouragements, nonsense words, _yes_ , yeah, you've got it, like that, keep going, and then he's coming, the feeling and sound of it enough to drag the tail end of hers along in its wake, stretching it into long, tingling heat that shudders through her body. 

He finally lets go of her hand, sinking down on top of her, but keeping his weight braced on his arms. She mutters a protest, too tired to form the actual words, and tugs him more fully down, until he’s a solid, heavy presence against her, both of them catching their breath. 

“That was good,” she finally says, trailing her hand up and down his back in slow, soft scratches. 

He laughs. “Yeah.”

“This quilt is really wet though.”

With a groan, he pushes himself off of her, and shuffles, half-stooped the few feet to his own bed. “Well, mine’s dry, see you in the morning.”

She throws a pillow at him.

(And joins him, of course.)

&&.

The biggest surprise in the wake of the shagging is how few surprises there are. She hadn’t realized just how much they’d committed themselves to the charade of being a couple, but all the groundwork has already been laid. 

They’re already holding hands practically everywhere, milking waiters out of free anniversary desserts, taking doofy pictures at every available turn.

But the one thing that _has_ changed, is the one she most hoped for — now it’s _real_. 

&&.

It was inevitable that they’d have to go back to Wales. 

This whole time, she’s been checking in with her mum, with school, with her old life back in London, but him, he just…didn’t. 

He hopped with her from place to place, finding trouble and fixing trouble, and neither of them had anchors now — not anywhere but with each other — but he acted as if he never had. 

(“I was drifting,” he told her once, two bottles of wine into a starry sky in the middle of Yosemite, and she realized just how true it was.)

Now, though, in the middle of her mum’s living room, they’re watching a news report of Rassilon being led away from the Doctor’s old lab in handcuffs. 

“Sorry,” Rose says. “Did you work for him long?”

The Doctor’s staring hard at the screen, eyes intent and the dimple on his cheek evident. 

“He raised me.”

It seems like all the sound has dropped out from the room, she can’t hear anything but a dull, roaring static. “What?”

He shrugs. “Parents died when I was a kid.”

There’d been hints of course, stupid little things she hadn’t paid much attention to. 

A joke in Rome where he’d asked for another slice of pizza — she’d called him Oliver Twist, and he’d said, “Not anymore.”

An insistence that they visit every child, every inch of the building at an orphanage in Russia.

Little moments, over and over again, lonely kids and school buses and how, _how_ , didn’t she realize?

“But…” she breaks off, unsure of what to say as he finally wrenches his gaze from the telly. 

“I’m sorry. I should’ve said straight out.”

“You…?” She’s not going to be able to form a sentence yet, no matter how hard she tries.

“They gave me a test when I was young yet, the results were good, they shipped me off to a special school. He was there.”

His tone sounds so hollow, so detached, she’s not sure what to make of it. 

“Are you…are you sad?”

He shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe. He changed a lot, when we got funding. Said a lot of scary things about what our work could do. Nobody should be perfect, Rose. And that’s what he wanted.”

She glances back toward the screen, the text at the bottom that lists the charges as “illegal testing.”

“Do you think there are more of us now? With powers?”

“Maybe,” he says. 

“Should we go?”

“Yeah.”

&&.

It’s a process, figuring out who’s been impacted. The Doctor’s own research had been coded, unreadable and unusable by Rassilon, but he’d pieced together his own, more dangerous, more unpredictable, and it takes them a month to narrow things down. 

They find three people, powers ranging from flight to pyrokinesis to invisibility. 

Together with her and the Doctor, plus Shareen and Mickey, it brings the number to seven. 

_The Super Seven_ , Mickey calls them, when they’re all rounded up in a back room at the Millennium Centre. 

They swear themselves to secrecy and hope for the best. 

(Fucking _Wales_.) 

&&. 

 

 

 


End file.
